A federal appeals court reversed its own ruling that upheld parts of an Arizona law that would stop some people from voting if they have not provided proof of citizenship.
In July, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected a request by Republican legislative leaders to delay a ruling by a trial judge barring enforcement of such a ban. But the judges issued a temporary stay ordering that anyone who tries to register to vote using a state form is required at the same time to provide documented proof of citizenship.
If they don’t, election officials must reject that application, the judges ruled.
Previously, election officials would register those individuals as federal-only voters who can only cast ballots in certain races, like the presidential election. That’s because state law requires proof of citizenship to register, but federal law does not.
In a split vote, a three-judge 9th Circuit panel reversed the previous order on Thursday. The two-judge majority found the initial order ran contrary to the Lulac consent decree, a legal agreement signed by the state in 2018 requiring election officials to accept registration forms submitted without proof of citizenship.
“As the district court held, the Decree requires the Secretary of State to direct County Recorders to accept state form registration applications submitted without documentary proof of citizenship … Because it requires County Recorders to reject such applications (and in fact criminalizes those who knowingly fail to do so), [the law] directly contravenes the requirements of the Decree,” according to the order.
Republican leaders, who praised the court’s July ruling allowing enforcement of the proof of citizenship requirement, criticized the new ruling by what Arizona Senate President Warren Petersen called “the radical Ninth Circuit.”
“They routinely engage in judicial warfare to carry out their extremist liberal agenda that's contrary to the laws our citizens elected us to implement,” Petersen said in a statement.
The two-judge majority rejected arguments made by the Republican National Committee that allowing the state to continue to register those individuals as federal-only voters would negatively impact Republican candidates.
“But the RNC has not at any point explained why the use of the State Form to register applicants without accompanying [proof of citizenship] to vote in federal elections, when identically situated applicants may register for at least federal elections without accompanying [proof of citizenship] through the Federal Form even with a stay in place, inflicts an irreparable ‘competitive injury’ on the RNC,” the panel wrote.
Instead, the judges found the stay issued earlier by the court would harm voters and election officials in the state by changing voter registration rules within days of Arizona’s primary election and months before the October 7 deadline to register for the November general election.
“A judicial stay is ordinarily a mechanism to preserve, not upset, the status quo pending appeal,” according to the Aug. 1 order.
Petersen said he planned to seek an emergency stay from the U.S. Supreme Court to again block election officials from accepting registration forms that do not include proof of citizenship.
